Forever Vampire Read Free Page B

daughter. She’s been kidnapped.”
    â€œYou want me to track a missing vampiress?” Vail thumbed his chin. “You know I don’t do vampires.”
    â€œYes, you can’t stand them. And yet you are one. How does that work again?”
    â€œThey disgust me.” Vail leaned forward. “Theyare weak, reek of mortal blood, and are unworthy of regard.”
    Rhys sighed heavily and tapped his fingers on the desk. They’d had this conversation before. Vail didn’t need to convince the man of his prejudices. Hell, he knew it was a ridiculous prejudice. But when a vampire was raised in Faery, he developed certain dislikes, and vampires were one of them.
    â€œWhat if I told you this mission isn’t going to benefit the vampires, but rather Faery?”
    â€œI don’t get it.”
    â€œA valuable Seelie court gown was also taken, along with the vampiress. Her name is Lyric Santiago. Seems she was wearing the gown at the time because she was about to hand it over to the Unseelie prince, or some dark lord—I don’t recall his title.”
    â€œLord of Midsummer Dark?”
    â€œYes, that’s him. I believe Zett is his name. You know him?”
    The muscles strapping Vail’s jaw tightened. Zett had been his nemesis since childhood. But Vail had had the last laugh before being banished from Faery months earlier. Zett had been outraged. Heh.
    â€œEver wonder where the title Vail the Unwanted came from?” he tossed out.
    Rhys nodded. “I see. So you don’t like the guy.”
    Vail blurted out a huffing chuckle. “To put it mildly.”
    â€œMore reason to help me recover the gown.”
    â€œAnd the vampiress?”
    â€œYes, her, too. But it’s the gown I’m focused on. Upuntil ten days ago, that gown was in the safe here in the office. We’d taken it in from the Seelie court as a means to cleanse it of some dark sidhe vibes. Something like that. I don’t understand it, only that it needed to be in the mortal realm a fortnight. They intend to reclaim it after that fortnight. Which is marked four days from now. Someone stole it from me, and I’ll give you one guess who that someone was.”
    â€œThe Santiago clan?”
    Vail had heard the name muttered in the dark nightclubs as a connection to deeds even he could not fathom. The Santiagos were old-school vampire mafia, a self-styled tribe that followed none of the legitimate tribes’ ways. Thieves, cutthroats and murderers populated their ranks.
    Vail avoided tribes—he didn’t require any modicum of family, no matter the form—but most especially he avoided the vampires.
    â€œSo why steal the thing, then put it on her daughter and hand her off to the Unseelie lord?”
    â€œI’m told she was merely trying it on, and had intended to take it off before the exchange. I’m guessing the gown was leverage for something.”
    â€œNot the daughter? What, is she ugly and has a snaggle-fang?” Vail chuckled to imagine a vampiress with such an affliction.
    â€œShe’s known as the ice princess, and I’m told she is stunning. Well, I’ve a picture here.” Rhys thumbed through a row of files in his bottom desk drawer and tossed a photo across the desktop to Vail. “I’m not surewhat sort of deal was made between Santiago and the Midsummer darkness—”
    â€œLord of Midsummer Dark.”
    â€œYes, whatever. All I know is I need to get that gown back before the Seelie representative returns for it. The sidhe are the last nation on this earth I want to piss off.”
    â€œYou are not a wib, old man.”
    â€œI don’t know Faery speak.”
    â€œIt means you’re not stupid.”
    Vail leaned forward to glance at the photo. He wasn’t about to touch it—that would show too much interest—but then he did. Bright white teeth. Brilliant whites surrounding blue eyes. And long ribbons of